down pat
8
7.5
- idiom
- Informal
:
dominado
- After weeks of practice, she finally had the presentation down pat.
- get it down pat
- thing down pat
- routine down pat
And man, did she get her new beloved lines down pat.
- And man, did she get her new beloved lines down pat.
- Oh, yes, you got the Ohio pronunciation down pat.
- But all of this hidden knowledge that I'm sure people who work in Hospice must have a down pat because they're taught.
Examples
-
All the details were down pat, but there was no emotional sense of the times.
Blog text (7) -
She's got the role down pat, but continues to make it fresh and funny.
Blog text (33) -
I got this down pat.
-
You seem to have it down pat.
-
Here was a kid with his act down pat
-
Until I get this whole cop thing down pat.
-
Of course, the crew has it all down pat.
-
I have the walk down pat.
Fiction book (2001) -
Today, they have it down pat.
Academic text (2004) -
Johnny and me got our end of it down pat.
Synonyms
1
8.0
Learned well so you can do it without mistakes
Learned so well that you can say or do it without thinking
You understand it completely and can use or explain it easily
Antonyms
How Familiar
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase gives partial cues: 'down' can mark completeness and 'pat' can mean exact or ready, so together they suggest something completed or perfectly done. However, the adv./adj. sense of 'pat' and the idiomatic assemblage 'down pat' are not transparently predictable for a B1 learner who only knows basic senses of the words, so prior exposure is usually needed.
Etymology
Down pat may come from the picture of pressing something flat with a quick pat so it lies down and stays in place. So, if you have something down pat, you know it 'perfectly' or 'by heart'.